Diana Damrau and Joseph Calleja – October 24, 2020 Online

Two of opera’s greatest artists perform live from the Cappella Palatina of the Royal Palace of Caserta—a spectacular chapel that provides the perfect setting for a program that includes favorite excerpts from Puccini’s Tosca, as well as other popular duets and arias. Soprano Diana Damrau and tenor Joseph Calleja, both longtime Met stars known for holding nothing back onstage, are sure to pull out all the stops for this performance.

The Program

“Mario! Mario!”
From Puccini’s Tosca

“E lucevan le stelle”
From Puccini’s Tosca

“Vissi d’arte“
From Puccini’s Tosca

“Una parola, o Adina … Chiedi all’aura lusinghiera”
From Donizetti’s L’Elisir d’Amore

“Ma se m’è forza perderti”
From Verdi’s Un Ballo in Maschera

“Bel raggio lusinghier”
From Rossini’s Semiramide

“La fleur que tu m’avais jetée”
From Bizet’s Carmen

“Parle-moi de ma mère”
From Bizet’s Carmen

“Höre ich Zigeunergeigen”
From Kálmán’s Gräfin Mariza

“Granada”
By Agustín Lara

“Non ti scordar di me”
By Ernesto De Curtis

“Ave Maria”
By Johann Sebastian Bach / Charles Gounod

German soprano Diana Damrau has been an audience favorite since making her Met debut in 2005 as Zerbinetta in Ariadne auf Naxos. Since then, she has given nearly 150 performances of 17 roles, including Violetta in La Traviata, Elvira in I Puritani, Juliette in Roméo et Juliette, Leïla in Les Pêcheurs de Perles, the title roles of Manon and Lucia di Lammermoor, Amina in La Sonnambula, Gilda in Rigoletto, Adina in L’Elisir d’Amore, Rosina in Il Barbiere di Siviglia, and Countess Adèle in Le Comte Ory. In 2007, she was named a Kammersängerin of the Bavarian State Opera, where her roles have included Violetta, Lucia, Antonia/Giulietta/Stella in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, and the Countess in Le Nozze di Figaro, among others. She has appeared to great acclaim at the world’s greatest opera houses, including La Scala, Deutsche Oper Berlin, Covent Garden, LA Opera, the Vienna State Opera, the Paris Opera, the Salzburg Festival, Spain’s Castell de Peralada Festival, and in numerous cities throughout Europe and Asia. In 2007, she became the first artist in Met history to sing both Pamina and the Queen of the Night in Die Zauberflöte in a single season.

Born in Malta, tenor Joseph Calleja made his professional operatic debut when he was only 19 years old, as Macduff in Macbeth at his nation’s Astra Theatre. He made his Met debut in 2006 as the Duke in Rigoletto and has since appeared in nearly 100 performances of 10 roles, including Cavaradossi in Tosca, Gabriele Adorno in Simon Boccanegra, Edgardo in Lucia di Lammermoor, Macduff, Rodolfo in La Bohème, the title role of Faust, Hoffmann in Les Contes d’Hoffmann, and Nemorino in L’Elisir d’Amore. In 2017, he starred as Pollione in the premiere of Sir David McVicar’s new production of Norma, which served to open the 2017–18 season, and in all, he has starred in four Live in HD transmissions. Highlights of recent seasons include appearances as Cavaradossi and the Duke at the Vienna State Opera; the Duke, Don José in Carmen, and Pollione at the Bavarian State Opera; Rodolfo in Luisa Miller at Lyric Opera of Chicago and in Hamburg; Rodolfo in La Bohème in Dresden; Cavaradossi in Aix-en-Provence; and Edgardo at Deutsche Oper Berlin. One of his native land’s biggest celebrities, he was selected to serve as Malta’s first cultural ambassador in 2012, and he recently teamed up with Malta’s Bank of Valletta to form the BOV Joseph Calleja Foundation, which serves to help children and families in need.

After graduating from Manhattan School of Music, New Jersey­–born pianist Vincenzo Scalera worked as an assistant conductor with the New Jersey State Opera. He continued his studies in Italy, and in 1980, joined the music staff at La Scala, assisting conductors Claudio Abbado, Riccardo Chailly, Gianandrea Gavazzeni, and Carlos Kleiber. He has collaborated with generations of exceptional singers, including Montserrat Caballé, Leyla Gencer, Maria Guleghina, Sumi Jo, Raina Kabaivanska, Katia Ricciarelli, Renata Scotto, José Carreras, Juan Diego Flórez, and Cesare Siepi, among numerous others. He first appeared at the Metropolitan Opera in 2014, accompanying Vittorio Grigolo’s solo recital, and has also performed at many of the world’s most prestigious music festivals, including Salzburg, Edinburgh, Martina Franca, Jerusalem, Istanbul, Orange, and Pesaro’s Rossini Opera Festival. He recently completed a German recital tour with Andrea Bocelli and was a longtime collaborator with Carlo Bergonzi. He is a member of the staff of La Scala’s Accademia d’Arti e Mestieri and was an instructor with the Renata Scotto Opera Academy in Savona, Italy, teaching classes in accompanying for pianists and operatic literature for singers.

https://www.metopera.org